


Breadcrumbs

by shipshape_sheep



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Case Fic, Cuddling, M/M, affection and compliments, canon typical violence and scariness, daring rescues, unlikely friends become so much more
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-09
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-13 09:08:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11756580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shipshape_sheep/pseuds/shipshape_sheep
Summary: Oswald proves to be unexpectedly helpful during a serial killer investigation. Jim shows his appreciation.





	1. Chapter 1

Martin Hartwell, 53, and Mary-Louise North, 19, had never met each other in life, but their lifeless bodies lay slumped side by side in the alley behind the Rose Thorn Bakery as if they were two old friends who had decided to take an impromptu late afternoon nap. Mary-Louise's head rested on the older man's shoulder. Her lips had been painted into an upturned smile, like a porcelain doll. Martin's face was powdered, too, with theatrical apples of rouge on each cheek. They both wore wigs of curly yellow yarn and ruffled lederhosen embroidered with tulips. 

Jim stared down at the corpses. The orange sunlight slanting into the alleyway and the smell of baking bread gave the gruesome scene an eerie, jarring peacefulness, despite the bustle of cops and examiners taking notes and snapping photos. This was the second set of bodies in bizarre outfits discovered in the past two weeks. The previous victims, a teenage intern and a middle-aged investment baker from opposite ends of town, were found in Renaissance-faire garb behind the Royal Castle Hotel off the interstate. 

“This is some creepy shit,” Harvey said from behind Jim's shoulder. Jim twitched, startled out of his reverie.

“I don't even know where to start,” Jim muttered.

Harvey grimaced and knelt by the bodies. “Take a look at this. They're holding hands,” he said. The victim's limp white hands were draped over each other. Jim felt his pounding headache intensify.

Jim gazed into their powdered faces. Their glassy, staring eyes reflected the setting sun in fiery discs. He rubbed his forehead with his thumbs and groaned.

“Any theories?” Harvey asked, rubbing his stubbly jaw. “I have one. I'm going to venture a guess that whoever did this was one sick son of a bitch.”

“I don't know what's going on in this town anymore.” Jim turned away from the bodies. He couldn't stand to look at them anymore, and his headache was so strong that his vision was ringed by a black haze. “I used to think we were making a difference. Helping people. But if this is the new normal...”

“Hey,” Harvey said, his gruff voice softening as he pulled himself to his feet. Jim felt his heavy hand settle on his shoulder. “This case is shaping up to be a doozy. Why don't you let me handle this one? Take some time away from the freaks and the bodies, huh? I know you've been feeling shaken up ever since all the stuff with the virus...”

Jim's pained squint gave Harvey the signal to back off, which he did, raising his palms and raising his shaggy eyebrows.

“All right, all right, we're not talking about that. But at least take the rest of the evening off. We can deal with the painted yodelers in the morning.”

Even Harvey's rough-edged, clumsy pity was too much for Jim to handle. He left the alleyway without turning back.

On the way back to his car, Jim heard an all-too-familiar voice cry out from the shadowy alleyway beside the bakery. 

“Jim! There you are!”

Why did Oswald always look so genuinely delighted to see him? Oswald cradled a pink cardboard box under one arm. From the slightly bent way he carried himself as he made his way down the sidewalk, Jim could tell the bullet wound in his stomach was still bothering him. Still, his eyeliner, his gelled hair, and his impeccably tailored suit—charcoal gray with a plum-colored velveteen collar—were as crisp as ever. Temporary death hadn't touched his flair for fashion.

“I don't have time for this, Oswald,” Jim said—flatly, but without his usual exasperation. Oswald had genuinely come through for him during the attempted toxin bombing, and Jim felt guilty for snapping at him earlier in the alleyway.

Oswald caught up to Jim, who paused reluctantly, his arms wrapped around his chest. “Rough day at the office?” He pulled the box out from under his arm and opened it. “Cannolis. Not the city's best by any means, but conveniently located next to your crime scene.”

Jim peered down at the neat row of cream-filled pastries. They were the kind with miniature chocolate chips. He squinted up at Oswald, who gazed back at him with an expression of such raw earnestness that Jim took one out of pity. It tasted...good. Actually, somewhere deep in the secret chambers of his heart, Jim had really wanted a cannoli.

“Thanks,” Jim said, with the faintest ghost of genuine gratitude.

Oswald beamed for a moment, sunny and radiant, but his grin soon disappeared under a cloud of sneaky self-satisfaction. “So, have you figured it out yet? The colorful costumes, the wigs, the makeup?”

Jim's gratitude evaporated, too. They both had their walls back in place. “What do you mean? Do you know something about the murders? Did one of your freak friends have something to do with this?”

In Oswald's face, Jim saw a twinge of real, wounded pain. “Who do you think I am, Jim? I'm not in the business of killing innocent people. When I murder someone, they deserve it. I make sure of that.”

Jim barked out a rueful laugh. “I might be able to trust you, Oswald, but I don't know about your friends. Didn't the girl in the alleyway have a flamethrower?”

The corner of Oswald's mouth quirked into a shy smile. “Your confidence in me is much appreciated, Jim. Believe me, flamethrowers aside, I'm selective about the company I keep. Very selective. For instance, I think most of the cops in Gotham are crooked, incompetent morons, but I make an exception for you, don't I?”

Jim sighed. “What do you want to say, Oswald? Spit it out. It's been a long day.”

“Let's find a better place to chat, shall we? You look beat and I'm, well, still recovering.” Oswald gestured to his midsection with a wincing smile. “Besides, it's better for me to be somewhat less public, at least until I'm ready to formally reintroduce myself into society. There's a little cafe around the corner. Some coffee to go with your snack?”

They sat across from each other in a dark corner, away from the window. From the knowing way Oswald nodded to the tattooed woman behind the counter, Jim knew Oswald didn't have to worry about being ratted out as the Missing Mayor. 

Jim couldn't believe he was sitting in a cafe across from Oswald Cobblepot, listening to Edith Piaf on the radio and watching the sun set between the threadbare checked curtains on the windows. It all felt so...cozy. His evening plans had been to go back to his empty apartment and drink himself into a stupor. Maybe this was better in some way—healthier. Then again, nothing was ever quite wholesome when it came to Oswald Cobblepot.

The tattooed woman—the blue octopus on her forearm was quite striking in its size and vibrancy—brought a chipped mug of black coffee to Jim and a brimming cup of something that smelled like cinnamon to Oswald, who gave her an appreciative smile and slipped her a bill. Judging by her face when she saw the denomination, it was a more than substantial tip.

“Speaking of trust,” Oswald muttered to Jim once the woman disappeared into the back of the cafe. “You never can be too careful. I used to have real respect in this town...not anymore. You never know who's gonna stab you in the back. Or the front.”

Jim let out a chuckle and raised his eyebrows. “You're one to talk.” Oswald scowled, and Jim went back to sipping his coffee—surprisingly smooth and good. Much better than the burnt crap he overboiled at home. “Okay, okay. Go ahead with your theory. I'm all ears.”

“The bodies you found behind that tacky hotel on the interstate. You found something in their pockets, right?” Oswald had adopted a very annoying singsong tone, like an elementary teacher who knew he had caught a naughty student in a fib and was trying to elicit a confession. God, this guy was doing Jim's headache no favors. 

“Yeah. And what was that, again?” Jim pressed his lips into a thin line. “Remind me.”

“Breadcrumbs.” Oswald grinned and leaned back in his seat, setting down his empty cup with a self-satisfied clink. A quaint expression floated into Jim's mind: the cat that caught the canary. “I have a friend in the forensics department, if you're wondering about how I stumbled on that little tidbit. I've got friends all over the place.”

“Well, that doesn't surprise me at all. You're a very friendly guy.”

Oswald ignored Jim's sarcasm. “So—breadcrumbs, the lederhosen couple in the bakery alley. Hansel and Gretel, obviously. Rose Thorn Bakery--”

He paused, gesturing with his skinny, pale hands, as if waiting for Jim to finish his sentence. When Jim didn't, he deflated, looking put out.

Jim sighed and tried to flag down the barista, who was behind the counter, scrolling through her phone and aggressively pretending not to listen to their conversation. “Listen, can I get the abridged version of this whole production? I've got painkillers and a bottle of whiskey waiting for me at home, and I promised them I'd be home early, so...”

“Really, Jim? I guess I shouldn't be rude. Maybe you had a deprived childhood. Latchkey kid. TV babysitter.” Oswald rolled his eyes. Jim wondered, not for the first time, how long it took him each morning to apply his eyeliner so it looked perfectly smudged. 

To Jim's surprise, Oswald broke into song. He had a reedy, crooked, but tuneful voice. “Dornröschen war ein schönes kind, schönes kind, schönes kind, Dornröschen war ein schönes kind, schönes kind...” The melody rung a bell for Jim--”Mary Had a Little Lamb”--but he was unexpectedly shaken by the sincerity with which Oswald sang the verse. He caught a glimpse through the layers of ego and bitterness to a sweetly genuine core. 

The barista came by with a fresh mug of coffee and Oswald broke off, blinking, shaken out of a reverie of his own. Jim took the mug in his hands and drank, burning his tongue, hoping the steam would hide the redness across the bridge of his nose.

“Sleeping Beauty. Dornroschen. It means Rose Thorn.” Oswald explained, his voice faltering a little before finding its usual spiky rhythm. “That's your clue. Fairytales. Honestly, there's a serious lack of whimsy in your whole department. I knew it would catch up with you one day.” He winked.


	2. Chapter 2

“Sleeping Beauty?” Harvey wrinkled his forehead and bit into his tuna sandwich. “Sounds kind of like...oh, what's the term...bullshit to me.”

“I don't know.” Jim stared down at the scatter of files and papers on the scarred, coffee-ringed surface of his desk, trying to ignore the soles of Harvey's shoes propped up inches from his face. The dead eyes of the four victims stared up at him from grainy photographs. A jumble of bizarre symbols—hand-sewn costumes with clumsy stitching, pockets full of breadcrumbs, a hotel with crumbling pastel cupolas. “At least it's something. I can't make heads or tails of this.”

“I mean, Rose Thorn? That's our big break in the case? All of those hipster bakeries have weird names. Muffin's Going My Way. Croissant Your Heart and Hope to Pie.”

“You made up at least one of those,” Jim said, smirking despite himself. 

“Who'd you get this hot tip from, anyway?” Harvey rummaged through his crinkled lunch bag and came back with a stray potato chip. “Don't tell me it's that squirrelly little Penguin guy.”

“Say what you want about Cobblepot, but he's helped us out of a jam a couple times.”

Jim's bleary eyes scanned the M.E.'s report on the bakery victims for the dozenth time. Despite everything, he kind of missed seeing Ed's spidery handwriting and googly-eyed doodles in the margins. The new guy's paperwork was bland and full of jargon and abbreviations, making it difficult to read. As far as Jim could tell, nothing unusual had been found on the bodies...no breadcrumb trail this time. The costumes had been hand-sewn, but with generic fabrics available at any craft store. The yarn wig would have taken hours of intensive craftsmanship to make, but the yarn itself was standard wool, purchasable at any decent knitting shop. Other than the name of the bakery, there were no incriminating details screaming out at him.

“Oh, I'll say what I want about him. I can think of plenty of stuff to say. Creepy. Slimy. Murdery. And I'm just ramping up the ten-dollar words.” Harvey peered into his lunch bag, sighed, crumpled the bag into a ball, and launched it at the wastebasket in the corner of the room, where it bounced pathetically off the edge of the rim. “Speaking of Sleeping Beauty—you're looking a lot better. Get some actual shuteye last night?”

“Guess so.” Strangely, Jim had slept well the night before. After coming home from the cafe, he polished off the rest of the cannolis—Oswald insisted he take the leftovers home—and fell asleep right away, no booze required. He even managed to throw some clean sheets on the bed and change into pajamas. He had weird dreams, but that was nothing new. At least this time his dreams didn't feature black-eyed Tetch virus victims foaming at the mouth. He dreamed of Oswald, standing in his kitchenette in a slant of orange sunlight, chopping carrots and singing under his breath. In his dream, Jim sat at the kitchen counter and watched him, smelling herbs and garlic simmering in a pot on the stove, listening to that sweet, crooked voice, feeling drowsy and warm and safe.

It was the same feeling he had when Oswald appeared in his dreams as a solider—a feeling that they were old, old friends, that their history was full of laughter and long starlit conversations and not blood and bribes and venom. Jim woke feeling puzzled but rested, his headache gone.

“Glad to hear it, man. Not to get too touchy-feely, but I've been worried about you lately.” Harvey rocked backwards in his chair, fixing Jim with a knowing look beneath the brim of his battered hat. “So, do I get to know the name of this lucky mystery lady?”

Jim chuckled dryly, not glancing up from the files. “It's not like that.” 

Harvey snorted. “Yeah, sure.”

Jim ignored him and squinted down at the blur of medical jargon. Maybe if he stared hard enough, the name of the killer would burst out the page in huge flashing neon letters.

His phone jangled in his pocket, jarring him out of his frustrated daze. He answered it, rubbing his temple with one calloused thumb. “This is Gordon.”

“Jim!” Oswald's voice, a hoarse, panicky whisper. “I've got her, Jim. Parking garage, Gotham General. She's--”

Oswald cut off, and there was a scratching sound like the phone was being muffled by fabric. In the background, Jim could hear a distant clatter of metal against concrete.

Jim tensed in his seat, leaning forward as if he could launch his body into the phone and do something. “Oswald? What the hell is going on?”

“White van. License plate is...Z...W....I can't see,” Oswald hissed. Jim had never heard him so frightened before. “It's too dark. She's taking her--”

“Taking who?” Jim launched out of his chair and lunged towards the door. “Stay where you are. I'm bringing help.” 

Nothing on the other end but faint rustling and indistinguishable, echoing noises. 

“Oswald?” Jim shouted, breaking into a half-run, his shoes clapping against the marble staircase leading down into the GCPD lobby. “Where are you? What the hell is going on?”

“I'll take care of this,” Oswald said, “You can count on me. Just--” A burst of distortion. A clatter. Then—silence.

Jim realized he was halfway to the front doors of the lobby, standing in the center of a stunned crowd of officers, all frozen in the middle of their daily routines. His heart pounded and cold sweat poured down his face. Harvey grasped his forearm and turned him so they faced each other. 

“Woah!” Harvey said, staring into Jim's face with concern. “You're scaring the shit out of me. Are you okay? What's happening?”

Jim squeezed the silent cell phone in a white-knuckled, trembling fist. “We have to get to Gotham General. Now.”


	3. Chapter 3

Jim barely entered the glass doors of the hospital lobby when a frantic hospital administrator barreled up to him. 

“You're finally here,” she said, tucking a strand of frazzled red hair back into her white cap with a sigh. “Follow me. I'll try to explain.”

Jim had to almost jog to keep pace with the woman's rapid stride. The normally eerily silent white halls of Gotham General buzzed with activity—nurses made frantic but hushed phone calls at their stations, security officers muttered together in clusters, and a doctor tried to calm a sobbing, seemingly terrified patient in a sitting area. GCPD officers started to canvas the building with their notepads and steely glares. Jim had asked Harvey to search the parking garage, thinking they could cover more ground in a shorter amount of time, but now he regretted going in alone. His head swam and his stomach twisted when he thought about the fear in Oswald's voice, echoing again and again in his head on a neverending replay.

The administrator, who introduced herself as Mrs. Harlan, explained how a nineteen-year-old comatose patient had been kidnapped from her room by an unknown woman dressed as a nurse. She went on and on, talking about timestamps on security footage, eyewitnesses, all kinds of crucial details. But Jim's imagination swirled with images of Oswald in the parking garage. Why had his phone suddenly cut off? On the way to the hospital, Jim had tried to call him back again and again with no answer. Horrific pictures filled his mind's eye: Oswald knocked out with the butt of a gun and dragged lifeless into the back of a van, Oswald with a bloody pillowcase on his head in some dripping basement, Oswald left for dead in some dark, forgotten alley...

“You have no idea what it's been like around here lately,” Harlan said, her voice sharp and defensive. “After the Tetch crisis, we've been completely understaffed, underfunded, and overworked. It was only a matter of time until something like this happened.”

They turned a corner down a hallway with a tasteful gold plaque over the entrance reading: GRACIE LEWIS MEMORIAL WING. “This is the coma ward where the girl was taken,” Harlan explained tersely. 

At the last doorway on the right, a young nurse sniffled into a tissue as she was interrogated by a hospital security officer. She looked up when she saw them approach, her eyes streaming with mascara.

“Nurse Bethany, this is Detective Gordon. Tell him everything you told me.”

Bethany wiped her red, bleary eyes with her tissue. From the frightened expression on her face, it was obvious she had already been yelled at by Harlan and was anticipating another round of abuse from Jim.

“I swear, I thought that woman was a nurse coming to take Eleanor to a checkup.”

“The person who took the patient looked like a nurse?” Jim asked, peering into the hospital room. The white blanket had been tucked back neatly from the hospital bed, as if the patient had just gotten up from an afternoon nap. Someone had tried to lighten up the depressing atmosphere of pea-green walls and hospital equipment with fresh flowers and teddy bears. 

“She had a uniform, an ID badge, everything. Our turnover is so high—we've gone through half a dozen nurses since the Tetch virus. Half the time I don't even have time to learn their names. I figured this was just someone I hadn't had a chance to meet yet. I can't believe I could be so stupid...I'm going to lose my job...”

“Can you describe what she looked like?” Jim asked, his voice strained with impatience. “Face, age, build?”

Bethany shook her head miserably. “Just...normal. Not young. Maybe middle-aged. Dark hair?”

Jim's phone buzzed in his pocket. He jumped for it, thinking for one irrational second he might hear Oswald's voice on the other end. 

“Hey, Jim?” Harvey said. “Get down to the parking garage as soon as you can. There's something you're going to want to see.”

The last of the evening's red sunlight had faded by the time Jim entered the garage. Outside of the concrete structure, the sky was a deep, moody periwinkle. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary—rows of silent cars, a fast food wrapper rustling across the stained floor. Jim saw Harvey's bulky shape at the far end of the E row. His stomach flipped, thinking Harvey might step aside to reveal Oswald's body crumpled on the poured cement. 

Instead, Harvey handed him a black phone with a cracked screen. “Look familiar?”

Jim switched the phone on. The image was warped from the busted screen, but he could clearly see that the last call made on the phone was to “JIM ;).” 

“Winking smiley face, huh?” Harvey said, raising his eyebrows.

Jim's heart pounded in his throat, preventing him from commenting on the emoji. A few feet away, a technician was photographing a small area squared off with yellow caution tape. “Where did you find this?”

“Behind one of those concrete partitions. There's some blood spatter a few feet away. Not very much, but I'm guessing it's either from your buddy or from the coma girl.” Harvey took the phone out of Jim's numb hand and pressed a button.   
“Check this out.”

There was a blurry photograph of the open back of a white van. A fuzzy white shape—maybe a gurney—was being pushed into the van by a dark, hunched figure. You could see the license plate number partially obscured by the figure's legs.

“That's the full plate,” Jim said. “Dumbass. He must've leaned outside of the partition to snap that picture. That's when he got grabbed.”

“I already put out an APB,” Harvey said. 

Jim noticed that Harvey was staring deep into his face, hands on hips, with his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth pressed into a thin line.

“What?” Jim snapped. “Is this about that stupid winky face thing? Give me a break. A kid's been kidnapped.”

“Hey, your personal life's none of my business. But there's no way you're being taken in by this song and dance, is there? You're a gullible son of a bitch, but this is a whole new level.”

Jim walked towards where the technician was dusting the area with a fine white powder. Six raindrops of blood fanned out into a fine mist. Looks like someone took a pretty nasty blow, stumbled. A girl in a coma probably wasn't stumbling.

“What are you talking about?” Jim muttered. He felt pretty damn close to losing his breakfast.

“Please,” Harvey scoffed. “Penguin magically knows this girl's going to get nabbed from a coma ward? Then he risks life and limb to try and rescue her, conveniently calling you right in the middle of his daring escapade? You're getting set up like the fine china at high tea, my friend.”

Jim crossed his arms in front of his chest. “You think this is some kind of scam?”

“Sure do. He disappears under messy, scandalous circumstances. He needs to fix his rep. So he creates this whole fake kidnapping to make himself look good for his return.”

“He's helped us before.”

“Yeah, when he can get something in return. Listen, I know you're...friends with this guy. Maybe he's helped us out once or twice, sure. I just don't to see you in put yourself in danger.”

Jim thought back to the cafe. Until I'm ready to reintroduce myself to society, Oswald said, sipping his cappucino with a crooked, unreadable smirk. He had to admit—Harvey's theory didn't sound that far-fetched.

Then why did Jim still want to defend the man everyone knew was a backstabbing liar? Why did the terror in Oswald's voice sound so genuine? When Jim looked at that blurry cell phone—taken by a man taking a risk, putting his life on the line to help someone defenseless—he felt baffled pride, not suspicion.

“Let's wait until we have all the facts,” Jim said. The bloodstain seemed to shimmer up at him, full of dread and unanswered questions.

“Your funeral, man,” Harvey sighed, clapping him on the back. “Come one. Let's go do some paperwork.”


End file.
